Within the fall, we find the grace

사진: Unsplash의Svitlana

Using Yoga to Navigate Changes & Endings in Autumn

In the blink of an eye, September slipped by and we're now in the full flow of the hibernal season. A seminal period of introspective transition, the fall of autumn veils us in great change. Not only magical metamorphosis enveloping us in the physical landscape, but the oblique alchemy we feel deep inside us.

It's easy to forget the imminence of these changes as we slide out of the heady days of summer. The arrival of fall always feels so sudden, and we're subsequently forced to retreat inwards, physically and emotionally. Increased isolation and dipping temperatures can incite uncomfortable feelings of freezing isolation as much as compassion and cosiness. As we retreat inwards and avow the changes within, we can sympathetically tend to fizzy feelings that manifest as we delve into the fall. Through ends, we find new beginnings. Through change, we find consonance. If we change our perspective of the change within and around us, within the fall we can find grace.

Soaring & Falling Through Fear

As the air dries, becoming thinner and coarser, and the vivacious colours of summer quickly dull to puce and umber, we might experience mixed emotions. Mourning the release of summer and its energetic abundance, we can sail through a gnawing resistance to these changes.

Soaring through the serotinal phase of later summer [early autumn], we feel comforted by threads of light that still drape across the earth, and the final effusion of frondescent flowers dotted about. We hang on to hope, until the full fall comes. A plaintive plunge as we face the penumbra perimeter of winter. With prescience, we know those ruinous, darker days are near; cold and drawn out, a baleful period that feels interminable.

In this fear, we fall away from the most important part of the fall – the conversion of what has been into what is needed to pass. A graceful death devoid of chaos, teeming with purpose. And this need to release is commensurate with our lives, as we continuously lose parts of ourselves and navigate changes to who we are. Physically, emotionally, and spiritually.

How we conceive that change depends upon the synergism between inner and outer perspectives. We can either collapse into ourselves, swirling in the undulation of the season, or we can be held in its auriferous glow; cradled in colour, resplendent in its grace.

Through sententious holistic practices, we can support our perceptions of such profound endings synonymous with the season; accepting the parts of us that fall away and heeding how we will regrow.

Photo by Ray Bilcliff

The Necessity of the Fall

Auriferous, rubescent leaves and architectonic cobwebs frozen in time, dangling from spiny tendrils remind us of the gentle beauty we can find in endings. Not necessarily of physical death, but the cessation of what we've clung on to, what we've carried with us and are ready to release.

Translucency of diminishing leaves unveils delicate reticulations and the bare bones of existence. Erosion of business and externalising energy supports us to strip back to our spiritual skeleton. Peeling away the residue of daily life and once again understanding who we are and what we need.

How necessary it is for the leaves to fall. To detach from the trees. To allow their bodies to rest. Just like we discharge what we no longer need, so we too can repose.

Reverent respite and rest. No force or expectation. Quiet being and intricate engineering. Introspective and exercising the parts of us muffled by the busy being of summer. In the coma of autumn, we pause and exhume hidden parts of us. We find new life.

Practice for Graceful Falls

When stormy winds whip around us, we experience a neurogenic response. Deep within our nervous system – so delicately connected to our natural surroundings – we can feel wary twitches and the creeping anxiety aligned with ashen skies and baron landscapes. Undulation in the air around us can provoke an implacable volatility within us.

Photo by Natalie Bond

Yoga supports the complex layers of physical, emotional, and spiritual being to weather the storms of changes, like the shift we experience in the autumnal descent. As we see the metamorphosis in our external world, we may feel the urge to resist change within us. Through yoga and synonymous holistic practices, we can embrace the tools we need to disinter discomfort, finding the beauty in its wake.

Pronating the heart towards the sun and the sky invites the light we need to shine through the holes of parts lost and illuminate the precious process of regrowth.

Respecting the rhythm of the day; synchronising with sun light to stir energy, and cocooning beneath moonlight, swaddling the sleepiness we experience in longer periods of darkness.

1. Vrksana – 'tree posture' – repairing the disunion between self, space, and universe. Rooting through the physical and metaphysical planes and embodying a mirror image of the world around, for deeper connection to the environment forcing us to confront changes – and fears – within us. In this state of concentration and required equilibrium, we resign from external noises, returning to the rhythm of internal conversations, vital tools supporting us through any feelings of dullness in the discomfort of change.
2. Utthita trikonasana – 'extended triangle posture' – exemplifying humility and acceptance, the polarising positioning of the arms releases to the earth, and reaches to the sky. A venerable burial of what is gone, and a reverent reach to what is to come. The heart is open and centred, forward and ready to receive. Invoking feelings of love, but grounding with humble respect, both the heart and root chakras are nurtured and balanced.
3. Anahatasana – 'melting heart posture' – yolking the heart with the earth, we supplant energy from the root to the heart. In deference, we emanate with the hum of the earth. Immobile and held, we release and rest. Encouraging attention to the breath, energy is more efficiently networked around the body, supporting the nervous system as it frows more sensitive in response to the unfolding transformation around us and within us.
4. Ananda balasana – 'happy baby posture' – a playful addition in an austere period, the inner child is embraced. Vulnerability echoes a need for nourishment within the womb – to be held, protected – of which we can establish within the space around us. Within the structure of the air and the physical presence of universe. The root chakra – deeply threaded within the airy autumn season – receives increased blood flow; and the heart receives a well-earned rest as it risks exhaustion from assimilation of exhumed feelings as we release the old, rest in the being, and expand as new.
5. Chakrasana – 'wheel posture' – maintaining equanimity of energy, vital flow is achieved up and down the arches and stretches of the body. Commanding strength and concentration, the breath is deepened, suffusing the parts we usually conceal, scrunch, and strain. Volant, suspended in space, defying the breezy undulation of the season. Invulnerable to capriciousness, we are solid, sturdy, and strong. As we release, we fold down with ease, further communicating the concept of grace within the fall. Gifted with a new perspective of the changes happening within us and around us.

Embracing Agony in Expansion

Photo by Imad Clicks

As our self-proposition evolves and expands, the edges we contain ourselves within may feel stretched, pushed, limited, and sharp. Like the trees rattling in the wind, forced to reconcile premature parting with their leaves – bare and exposed – so are we shaken by traumas we've buried. Emotions we've diluted. All in favour of carrying on.

Autumn blesses us with space to stop serving externally and redirect our attention internally. Yoga calms the storms rolling over the horizon, supporting us to hear the words we've hushed with displaced energy; acknowledging and accepting the parts of us we no longer need.

Within the womb of autumn, we can feel rejected in cold abandonment or nurtured with warm embrace, depending upon our perspective. Through tendentious yoga practices, we can rebalance our thoughts, retune our perspectives, and reduce the residue of loss and change, cultivating the grace of the fall and the true beauty of our endings.

Main – Photo by Jérôme Prax on Unsplash